Lakota Orthography Reclamation

“It is time the Lak̇ot̄a language returns as a vehicle of empowerment.”- Albert White Hat, Reading and Writing the Lakota Language.

So the other day I was looking up things for the Lak̇ot̄a Iyap̄i Ok̇olak̄iċiye Orthography, often referred to as the White Hat orthography and stumbled upon a post in my search results by an admin on the lakotadictionary.org website. This website is run by the Lakota Language Consortium. Although I do not know who wrote this post other than that they are an admin for the site that went by the name nahomnikhiye, it does really sum up much of the talking points and propaganda we’ve been fed over the years for the New Lakota Dictionary Orthography popularized by the Lakota Language Consortium so I wanted to respond to it here.

For those not in the know, orthography has been a big fight amongst us Lakota since the (non-) Lakota Language Consortium started to insert themselves on us starting in the early 2000’s and continuing into the now. One of their big issues is the way we write our language. The founders of this consortium- Austrian Anthropologist, Wilhelm Meya (Coleman, 2013), and the Czech Hobbyist Linguist who refers to himself as Crazy Buffalo, otherwise known as Jan Ullrich, have made all out marketing and propaganda pushes through the years to force their writing system on the Lakota people. (This is why I call them the non-Lakota Language Consortium). Many of the younger Lakota language teachers now parrot these talking points without much thought as I once did in the past. After all the intrusion and propaganda and belief that this is a settled issue, there is now a call from their language warriors for all of us to “stop fighting” and to conveniently forget how we all got here. I contend however that we are not fighting, we are reclaiming. We are reclaiming our language and part of this reclamation is reclaiming the way we chose to write our oral language.

Much of the argument put forth by the LLC for their orthography is a lot of opinion and preference in an effort to sell more of their products back to us, the Lakota people.  In their orthography video (which is basically the post below strung out over a 15 minute period), History of Lakota Orthography, they make it a point to let everyone know that they never copyrighted their orthography. (They do take a dig at the White Hat Orthography or his book Reading and Writing the Lakota Language without the courage of naming Albert or the elders he worked with which doesn’t surprise me).  This perked my ears, the claim of never copyrighting their orthography, because this makes me think that they are very aware of what they are doing in regards to their copyrighting of other things, like their dictionary and grammar book. For more info on this please read my previous blog, Ochethi Shakowin Data Sovereignty. Their whole video is basically to pedal their products which they do at the end.

The reason I bring this up though is that they have created a system of dependence. Their writing system leads to their products and their products to their orthography.  I compare it to the old factories who would give their workers company currency that is accepted only at their factory stores to continue to feed the monster. You want to look up a word in their dictionary? You better know how to write it in their orthography. Their orthography points to their resources and their resources back to their orthography. 

I recently ran across a phrase popularized by a Canadian communication theorist, Marshall McLuhan, “The medium is the message.”  This hit me between my eyes in regards to orthography.  I couldn’t help myself in thinking, what are we saying by the orthography (the medium) we use (and not even necessarily what we are saying)? Especially when there are already beautiful orthographies that have been created by Lakota/Dakota speakers? 

Some examples; Lak̇ot̄a Iyap̄i Ok̇olak̄iċiye orthography- created by many elders, teachers, and speakers often referred to as the White Hat Orthography and the official orthography of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe, Lakota Sounds by longtime Lakota Teacher and First language speaker- Karen White Butterfly, and/or the Txakini Iya Wowapi created by First language speaker and Linguist Violet Catches-all of them unicode compliant.

Along with the technical parts of orthography, which I will discuss below, according to Dr. Mark Sebba in his book, Spelling and Society, some of the most important aspects of orthography are the social and cultural ones (Sebba, 2007). Clearly the LLC has missed the mark in regards to the cultural and social aspects of orthography. I don’t think attacking other orthographies, misleading people with half-truths, declaring their’s as the standard, and putting out propaganda is the best way to push something on free Lakxota people but this is the hand they played. As Lakxota people, we are fiercely independent. We still celebrate when our ancestors whipped the United States on Victory day- June 25.  We have also had our lands taken, our ways of life banned, our children sent to residential schools, English forced on us and all of this was for our own good. But we are still here. Now we are getting a writing system and all of our data and language taken and stuffed messily into shiny products that use this orthography for our own good so we can get the privilege of buying our own language back and turning away from our elders, their writing systems, and their efforts. 

Dr. Sebba speaks of orthography as being so much more than the phonetics, morphology, phonology, and technical linguistic aspects of the language (Sebba, 2007). I see different things now when I look at orthography.  I see the social and cultural aspects of orthography formation.  Now when I see people write with an x (Txunwin Violet’s orthography), or with Tunwin Karen’s writing system- I see resistance, I see strength, I see adaptability but I also oddly see the same stubborn resilience our ancestors had which is how we have survived as a people. I also see the conflict of our elders trying to navigate the uncomfortable terrain of turning their orality to literacy but doing it for us, the younger generations because we are so literacy focused. I see these efforts and sacrifices. I see them. I see the prayers and the struggles and the offerings. When I see the Lak̇ot̄a Iyap̄i Ok̇olak̄iċiye (often referred to as the White Hat orthography), I see a concerted effort of our people coming together to say, yes, how we write is important.  I see meetings that took place in Lakota, that started with prayer, ended with prayer, had a meal in between with the customary offerings, and laughter. I see the Elders. I see teachings. I see persuasion, not coercion, and concensus building. This is how Lakota meetings go and I assume have always gone.  I also see Tribal Sovereignty. I see Lakota empowerment. I see accomplishment. I see self-determination. 

What do I see when I see the NLD orthography? I see assimilation, I see colonization, I see us losing who we are, I see us dancing with our eyes closed, I see overcomplication-making mountains out of mole hills, I see the trampling of Tribal Sovereignty. I see dependence, I see our data being taken under our feet, I see the exploitation of our elders (like what happened with my Grandma).  How did these meetings take place when they were creating these orthographies that led to the NLD orthography? Was there prayer? Were these conversations in Lakota? Was there consensus building? Were they done with a do-gooder I know what’s best for them mentality? Did they make offerings? Maybe there were these things but it’s the feeling of not knowing and being unsure and even having to question at all that should make us all stop and think, I mean really think about what’s going on and who the authorities are or should be.

Dr. Sebba ends his book with this, “Orthographies are not simply remarkable technological achievements, though they are that. They are also complex social and cultural achievements, best viewed as sets of practices- some highly conventionalised and others relatively unconstrained. They are ‘not socially neutral exteriors of written language, but integrated parts of value clusters or systems’ (Wiggen 1986: 410). They are microcosms of language itself, where the issues of history, identity, ethnicity, culture, and politics which pervade language are also prominent. For those who are concerned about ‘standards’ and ‘standardisation’ in the face of the new technological developments like email and text-messaging, I would also emphasise that orthography, like language itself, is creative. Gunther Kress has written in his book on children’s spelling (2000:14) that in the economy of the near future ‘the identities and personal dispositions that will be most highly valued, and most essential, will be those of flexibility, creativity and innovation’. Just as we- readers, writers, speakers and scholars-celebrate the creativity, adaptability and cosmopolitan nature of orthography” (Sebba, 2007).

So to paraphrase Dr. Sebba, orthography is creative and we need flexibility, creativity, and innovation-not standardization.  We need more orthography, more diversity, more innovation. Maybe more in the vein of Leroy Curley’s, A Lakota Alphabet, a system based off of the moon cycles that does not use the roman alphabet at all. Me and my wife (forgive my grammar if it's wrong but it is just English after all) are working on a minimalist system with symbols, and not letters that is based on our ways of life. I also think it would be cool to base a pictographic system off of the old winter counts or stone writings-our earliest forms of literacy. 

But the LLC and their tentacles swear by their orthography and oftentimes defend it by saying it comes from Ella Deloria. To put it bluntly however, it is not Ella Deloria’s orthography. If things are changed to be “improved” upon then it is not the original work of the person.  Per their video, their orthography started with Pond, then Deloria, then Buechel, then Colorado, then the Lakota Language Consortium but they say it’s pretty much Deloria.  If it comes from Deloria then why not just use Deloria’s? (cue the propaganda and the violins.) I also suggest that this diacritic heavy writing system that Deloria used may have been forced on her by Boas. 

On page ix of Dakota Texts, “While there, they finalized the writing system for Dakota, Boas reinforcing in Deloria’s mind the necessity of distinguishing aspirated, unaspirated, and glottalized consonants. (Boas referred to it, writing to Deloria, as “the alphabet as we designed it”; Deloria characterized it as Boas’s “new way” of writing, “for comparative study of primitive languages.”) (Deloria, 2006). By Deloria characterizing this diacritic heavy orthography as “Boas’s new way of writing” and also the fact of Boas pressuring her to distinguish aspirated, unaspirated, and glottalized consonants; it seems to be yet another instance of white folks giving their opinions and trying to tell us natives how to do things.  In this case, how to write our language and what our language needs.  

So anyway, back to the post.  I wanted to respond to it because like I said previously, it sums up a lot of the talking points of the Lakota Language Consortium and their enablers.  It can be found here:

https://www.lakotadictionary.org/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=90&t=3091 and was written by an admin by the name of nahomnikhiye-which is kinda funny and a little ironic; the admin’s name translates to something like-causes them to turn around. 

It is a post in response to a user named Drew, “Drew wrote:

Hello,

Over the years I've collected various Lakota language resources with the intent of learning, and I'm interested in how you would compare yours to those of Eugene Buechel (Dictionary/Grammar book) and Albert White Hat (Reading & Writing the Lakota language). I also have the 2 book set "Lakota Tales and Texts in Translation', and a bilingual reader 'Songs and Dances of the Lakota'. I've noticed a difference in your spelling pattern compared to the others. If I start to learn using your course, will I have a difficult time reading the Lakota in these other books?

Thank you for your assistance,

Drew”

Their response, the admin nahomnikhiye, is in italics; my views are in plain writing.  I am writing responses to these things because I have heard all of these things many times over but yet most of these things have been unchecked and unquestioned through the years. I think most go along with these things because the people telling us these things have advanced degrees and many have assumed only good intentions. I do not hold this same sentiment or blind faith in individuals or institutions of higher learning.  I am no linguist or anthropologist however. I also have nothing to sell you. I am just a Lakxota/Dakota person, a struggling learner, parent to a little girl that we are trying to give the language to, a language teacher, and someone passionate about our language that always wants to question things and tries to find the simplest and most efficient ways of passing on our language to our children that honors our ancestors and our people.

Here is the response by nahomnikhiye on February 6th, 2012.

Nahomnikhiye: “Dear Drew,  

Each of the materials you mention uses a different spelling system, yet they do not even represent all the existing spelling systems that have been used for Lakota.”This has been a problem because it inhibits the development of Lakota literacy and the Lakota language revitalization efforts.”

To start this off-this is pure conjecture, saying that the different spelling systems inhibit the development of Lakota literacy and an even bigger leap of saying that this then inhibits revitalization efforts.  This is one of the foundational underpinnings inherent in this white logic and misses the most important thing- we are an oral culture. We view ourselves as an oral culture. Our language has been passed on for 41,000 years orally they say and now we are being hampered by multiple spelling systems?  I would suggest we really have been inhibited and hampered by genocide and colonization but I have been wrong this whole time because apparently it has been the way our language has been spelled.  This is the theme of how the LLC manipulates people. They set up the problem to give their solution in order to create dependence.  The problem is that our literacy and revitalization efforts have been inhibited by different spelling systems so they then can give us their solution, their orthography (which leads to their products) in order to create dependence on their products and orthography. 

But at the end of the day there is honestly no way to test this.  Keep reading.

Nahomnikhiye: “For these and many other purposes the language needs a standard orthography, one that is consistently based on the sounds of the language, one where the spelling represents one-on-one matches between sounds and symbols.” 

So there’s a lot to unpack but to start with, the NLD orthography is not a true one-on-on match between sounds and syllables although they push this narrative. It is a good try for formal writings but not for how our elders actually talk. One-to-one-match writing systems are referred to as “shallow” orthographies.  “Deep” orthographies are like English where a letter can make a number of varied sounds.  Think of the word(s) “Pacific Ocean” where the 3 c’s are all pronounced differently (Sebba, 2007). Our language has too many diphthongs and welded sounds to ever truly have a one-on-one match or shallow orthography. Diphthongs are when “a sound formed by the combination of two vowels in a single syllable, in which the sound begins as one vowel and moves toward another (as in coin, loud, and side)” (Oxford Dictionary), and welded sounds are when sounds are stuck so tightly together they make a new sound. 

If the New Lakota Dictionary (NLD) wants to be a one-to-one match it has to account for regular speech and these diphthongs and welded sounds.  An example of a diphthong is in the word “iyupte.”  Speakers will make the “ai” into a dipthong that sounds like the English “I” as in “I am sick of this crap.” The NLD currently does not account for this “i” sound but speakers say this sound.  Deloria wrote these diphthongs with arches above and below in some of her texts which would only add more diacritics.  See the word “eciyau” (with arches) for “eciyapi-they call him.”

From Deloria, E. A Chat with Mrs. White Face, American Philosophical Society

From Deloria, E. A Chat with Mrs. White Face, American Philosophical Society

Like above, the NLD does not account for or has not figured out how to standardize the diphthongs that come at the end of words such as “unyuhao kte= unyuhapi kte- we will have.”  In some old texts they add a “w” to make this sound- unyuhaw kte or like Deloria does above, with a “u.” NLD always pushes the one-sound-to-one syllable, phonemic, or perfect shallow orthography but it leaves a lot to be desired if this is their goal.

NLD also doesn’t account for the schwa in words like mna, gla, mni.  According to Dr. Redshirt in George Sword’s Warrior Narratives,  “A schwa or short /e/ sound occurs between consonants when a syllable begins with bl, gl, gm, gw, and mn” (Redshirt, 2016). Deloria noted these with a period like m.na, g.la, m.ni.  

Look at the word wakam.napi below.

From Deloria, E. A chat with Mrs. White Face, American Philosophical Society.

From Deloria, E. A chat with Mrs. White Face, American Philosophical Society.

I use Deloria so much because the NLD people force Deloria down your throat although I do understand Redshirt’s critique of some of her work as appropriating George Sword’s by not giving Sword credit for his narratives (Redshirt, 2016) but if it comes from Deloria like they say their ortho does- write it like Deloria and account for things like the schwas if you are truly seeking a one-to-one match.  

The “m” also does not fit their one-to-one match they are hoping for. There is the hard “m” sound like in machuwita (I am cold) but “m” is also used with an “a” as a nasal “am” sound in fast speech by elders.  Instead of speakers saying the formal wanbli, many will say wambli. More examples are txahanpi- (his/her moccasins), they’ll say txahamp.  This nasal “am” can also symbolize plural endings in fast speech.  I’ve heard Unci say “unyam” for “unyanpi” where she would kinda swallow the “m” at the end of words like when we swallow the “m” at the end of the word “mom.” 

Along with diphthongs there are letters that are stuck so tightly together that they make different sounds. I’ve heard some refer to them as “welded” sounds.  In Lakota, especially in regular speech you hear this with the words “wanyanka”, or “awanyanka.”  The “wanyanka” turns into “wyanka” taking on a different sound. The formal way to say “Sundance” is “Wi Wanyang Wachipi” but speakers often weld “wanyang” to “wyang” saying “Wi Wyang Wachi.”  They also use these welded sounds in “awanyanka”- to look after sb, changing it from “awanyanka” to “awyanka.”  I also heard my lekshi use these welded sounds with a diphthong in “wyankao kte” for “wanyankapi kte.” Good luck if you’re trying to have a one-to-one match orthography. Please forgive me for trying to explain these things in writing.  This exercise shows the limits of our literacy when trying to explain our orality. More on this below. 

Deep or non-rigid orthographies handle these things above very easily because they are not so rigid and structured and don’t have to try to fit into a one-to-one box.  Shallow orthographies may have to admit they aren’t as shallow as they proclaim or add more diacritics to show these welded sounds or diphthongs, or just pretend that regular speech doesn’t exist like the LLC does. 

I don’t know, maybe the LLC doesn't hear all the sounds of our language?

“For these and many other purposes the language needs a standard orthography” -again, this is based on a lot of assumptions. Lakota thought doesn’t operate on “standardization” and/or a heavy focus on literacy- or at least our elders don’t, and then to say that we need to standardize our literacy?!?! This seems preposterous. But if we are to standardize our literacy, shouldn’t it be one that our people have made?

We come from an oral culture (we also had sign language but this is for another time). You can see this in our stories; each a little different but with many of the same overall themes and formulas.  These are facets of oral cultures.  One formula I’ve found in many stories that I think that is interesting is where the characters in the story will throw a baby out of their thipi, the baby coming back in as a toddler, doing it again and then returning as a teenager, and then finally as an adult. In oral cultures these formula’s help the orator to remember the stories (also why characters are so big and there may be more violence). These are all to help the speaker remember the stories (Ong, 2013).

But anyway back to diversity, did Fallen Star’s mother dig from inside the thipi when no one was looking and fall down like in Deloria? Did she dig and open a hole in the sky and miss her family so much that she started to braid turnips and go down so far as she could then the braid broke like in Walker? Or did she fall straight through while out away from the teepee digging turnips after being told not to like in Peter Iron Shell’s telling?  Each thiyoshpaye and maybe even each individual teller told the story according to what they heard or even according to their own skill and their audience which could be ever changing, this was a facet of many oral cultures-I’m not saying our ancestors did this but I’m also saying they did not not do this (Ong, 2013). We don’t know.  But my question is do we need standardization? Do we need to standardize the Fallen Star stories?  

What my point is is that standardization is an obsession with cultures outside of our own- we valued diversity. We still value and respect it.  Go to two different sundances and you’ll see that the overall theme is there but no two are exactly the same. We value the snowflake more than the production line.  This is only something that needs to be changed if you’re viewing things from outside-looking-in and not inside-looking-in.  But even at that, people like Dr. Sebba (above) say orthography does not have to be standardized or put into a box.  But I will say again,  if we are going to standardize an orthography- standardize our literacy- which is a huge irony to many Lakota, then shouldn’t it be one lakota speakers created and not a retread narrative of something being forced on us for our own good by outsiders? 

But again, back to the “necessity” of having a one-to-one match or a shallow orthography, from Sebba, Spelling and Society, page 22,  “All this (research between deep and shallow orthographies) suggests that the structuralist insistence on ‘perfect’ phonemic orthographies was at best unnecessary, at worst bad science in its claim to deliver ‘learnability.’ Even if phonemic orthographies benefit learners at the early stages, mature readers may derive benefits from orthographies which have greater depth. Claims about learnability of orthographies continue to be made, however, without research to substantiate them” (Sebba, 2007). 

Sebba goes on to say- “What can we conclude from all this? The ‘learnability’ question is controversial and not easily resolved because hypotheses are difficult to test: the subjects are usually children, and multiple social and cognitive factors may be involved (for example, children have different levels of reading and phonological knowledge when they arrive at school or preschool, in practice the earliest environments where testing can be carried out). To compare ‘deep’ and ‘shallow’ orthographies requires a comparison between learners of different languages, usually in different countries” (Sebba, 2007).

To conclude, there are no ways to truly test the learnability of any orthography to another because of the diversity of the learners, the young children needed for these studies. So to say that we Lakota need a one-to-one orthography is propaganda and simply in this case, another white males opinion of what we need and what our language needs.  Nor is there anyone to conclude if it helps or hinders Lakota language revitalization efforts like suggested above.  For me personally, I believe the LLC’s insistence on their “shallow” or “phonemic” orthography has actually hindered language revitalization because of the constant discourse and false messaging it has caused and is yet another thing from the outside pushed on us through the doors many of us young people have opened but I believe it’s time we sit back and listen to our elders.  After using non-diacritic heavy orthographies-the ones that don’t mark stress and things like that, it’s tough to look at more than a sentence of writing in the NLD orthography (but again this may be more social and cultural than anything else). It’s just so busy with so much going on, it gives me headaches. I must admit, I scroll past when I see more than a couple sentences of it while scrolling on social media.

Nahomnikhiye: “The language needs to be liberated from the influence of English both in terms of spelling and structure.”

This is hilarious.  Liberated from English to what…...Czech? Austrian?  This is also said in the History of Lakota Orthography video I mentioned earlier. For those that don’t get this ridiculousness-these are white folks saying we need to liberate ourselves from the influence of English by the way we WRITE and also that they know how better to do this than we, you know, the Lakota people. If this isn’t saviorism, I don’t know what is? I guess it could be whitesplaining decolonization to Lakota people too though. Either way it’s messy and kinda funny.

Nahomnikhiye: “The orthography of the New Lakota Dictionary attempts to do this, it is a highly practical orthography (i.e. used for purposes of literacy) and at the same time it is consistent and linguistically sound.”

Again, it is consistent for irregular speech, written- but not for regular speech (fast speech) or how our elders actually speak, it does not account for this. The makers know that if it were to truly account for speech with consistency at a one-to-one level, the diacritics would be even more complex and elaborate than they are now like I spoke about above.   But that’s often the problem, shallow-diacritic heavy orthographies “are good for linguists, but not for readers or learners.” (Sebba, 2007) Deep orthographies can handle regular speech easily because they’re not constrained by an overabundance of rules. Sebba also talks about how reading will be quicker in the long run because deep orthography readers are not reading one symbol at a time (Sebba, 2007).

I would also challenge the “highly practical” statement here.  Is it truly highly practical to teach beginners a whole new writing system heavy with diacritics and stress? An alphabet and the names of more than 30-40 new letters they have to memorize?  Install a new keyboard on their computer and phone? (Good luck with an apple computer by the way.) Learn that new keyboard layout? Obsess over spelling and stress while being diverted from the important stuff that will actually help them- comprehensible input and listening? How much time is wasted on this? Throwing a new language at someone while throwing diacritics, a new alphabet and the names of all those new letters, and more tech at them?

If it’s for beginners, it's adding a lot of unnecessary obstacles for them to navigate. This is hardly efficient or practical.

I also believe that focusing on “stress” raises the “output filter” that Dr. Krashen speaks of meaning when we’re so worried about everything-our pronunciation, our grammar, our stress, it freezes us and hamstrings our speech, raising levels of fear and anxiety to the point we either can’t speak or we forget all of our words and what we’re trying to say (this happens to me a lot when I’m nervous) (Krashen, 1997).  Focus on communication and not trying to speak more correctly than Deloria. Not to mention the effects of historical trauma and lateral oppression in regards to our language that may make it difficult for some to speak. Lakota is stressful enough-we don’t need more stress by stressing about stress. All of this stress is making my blood pressure rise. If stress is important, note it in dictionaries like most languages do for reference, it does not need to be in the actual writing system. 

But if we are worried about our speaking-stress, pronunciation, and tone, these things will get better with hearing the language more- not from texts.  In our case, our orality came first. We've passed on our language for over 41,000 years orally they say and then writing systems tried to mimic our speech later. Not the other way around, we don’t try to get our speech from our writing and our pronunciation from diacritics.

Nahomnikhiye: "The dictionary and texts (and to a degree also the grammar) by Eugene Buechel use inconsistent spelling. As a result one cannot learn correct pronunciation from these materials.”

I’ve already mentioned it but we do not get correct spoken pronunciation from written materialsWe get it from hearing the language, from our ear-not our eyes.  (We can communicate through our eyes via writing, sign language, and gestures but we are narrowly speaking here about speech pronunciation).

If I put up Mandarin characters to someone who is not fluent in Mandarin without a speaker or knower of that language around, can we glean from the character how it’s pronounced? Can we get proper pronunciation from these materials?  But we could go and ask a speaker, teacher, or learner and hear them say it-and hear them say it again and again.  That’s how we can get the sounds in our heads and then we can try to say the sounds. The sounds of our language came first then people tried to mimic that in writing-not the other way around. We get our spoken pronunciation first from our ears and not our eyes. 

Nahomnikhiye: “These materials have various other problems that make them unreliable. For instance the Buechel dictionary was largely based on borrowing from a much older Dakota dictionary by Stephen Riggs, and most of the borrowed entries were never checked with native speakers. Additional errors were introduced during the editing done by Father Manhardt who decided to convert Buechel's relatively consistent spelling into another orthography and he did so in such a way that resulted in unreliable and inconsistent misspelling of most of the words. Manhardt's translation of the Tales and Texts collected by Buechel is flawed, to the most part.”

They must not have been too “flawed” or “unreliable” for the LLC to digest these into their zeitgeist. They have figured these texts out, these writing systems and resources and have helped themselves to this intellectual property by incorporating these into their corpus.  These misspellings are only viewed this way if you are viewing things from the outside-in, from the viewpoint of the LLC orthography in comparison to another. On another note, it's amusing that these white folks fight, argue, and criticize each other and their materials and writing systems on things concerning the Lakota people’s language.

Nahomnikhiye: "These and other things are described in detail in the introduction to the New Lakota Dictionary.

The bilingual reader 'Songs and Dances of the Lakota' is a wonderful resource, but it uses the simplistic spelling introduced by the missionaries, which means that unless one knows the language extremely well it is nearly impossible to read the text with full comprehension.

This again simply isn’t true and is someone's opinion. I can assure it is not “nearly impossible” to read because of a lack of a few diacritic marks. (By the way, this is a great resource and has recently been at the center of some controversy.)  Just to touch on it again, there are studies that show that diacritic heavy orthographies make reading harder and slower in the long run.  Again from Spelling and Society, p. 20, “Moving towards a deep orthography allows homophones to be distinguished while words whose pronunciation varies in context can be given a fixed representation. This latter notion has been referred to using the terms ‘unity of visual impression’ (Nida 1964: 25f) and ‘fixed word-images’ (Voorhoeve 1964: 130). Maintaining a fixed word image supports readers in developing a sight vocabulary, a set of frequently occurring words that can be recognized as a single unit without being broken down into their component letters (Bird 1999b:25) (Sebba, 2007).

So to summarize, deep orthographies like English allow you to take in more of the word at one time i.e. developing a sight vocabulary unlike shallow orthographies which may cause you to focus on smaller units and have to break down individual symbols/letters one at a time.

Nahomnikhiye: “If you learn the consistent phonemic spelling used in the New Lakota Dictionary and other LLC publications you will not only be able to learn the correct pronunciation but you will also gain better understanding of the older publications written in the inaccurate missionary spelling.”

You will learn correct pronunciation from hearing the language; our elders, but okay, they’ll keep beating this dead horse. And again, the missionaries' “inaccurate” spelling is only inaccurate to the LLC’s hopes of standardization. (I can’t believe I’m defending missionaries-makxasitomniyan, ohiyaye lo! (you win universe!))  I thought just a little while ago the writer said that these older publications are nearly impossible to read but after using their orthography they are not? This is how neo-colonization works. Colonization sets up the problem (unreadable texts) so it can then set up the solution (read using their orthography) and create dependency (you need us or else…). (For more on this and the use of trauma narratives, check out this article by Shelbi Nahwilet Meissner, The moral fabric of linguicide: un-weaving trauma narratives and dependency relationships in Indigenous language reclamation).

Nahomnikhiye: “The book by Albert White Hat (Reading & Writing the Lakota language) uses a consistent and reliable orthography (except that it does not mark word stress, an important feature of Lakota pronunciation). Anyone who learns the spelling used in the New Lakota Dictionary will have no problem reading and understanding the orthography used in Albert White Hat's book.”

Again, focusing on stress makes your stress rise, and I suggest raising your output filter.  Stress being an important feature to Lakota pronunciation is again, simply one person’s opinion.  Fine tuning our stress is more for the advanced learner and is not something we need to throw on beginner’s or into a writing system. Like I mentioned before, other languages note stress in dictionaries for reference, and not in their actual writing systems.  On another note, not all stress is consistent. Stress can vary from individual speaker to individual speaker and from community to community, and even context to context so to try to standardize stress is more production line outside-looking-in thinking and not inside-looking-in thinking. But why must we filter a Lakota person’s book and writing system through the LLC orthography first in order to understand it?  This, again, is an attempt to set up the problem (trouble reading a fluent speaker's book) to give us the solution (filtering it through their orthography) to create dependency (you need us or else….). 

Nahomnikhiye: “In the past decade there has been a growing support for the new orthography in Lakota country and most schools are now using it as the standard spelling for Lakota.”

This is how LLC math works. One or a couple schools may have used  their stuff around 2012 when this post was written but they’ll mislead and say “most.”  They’ve been called out a number of times for giving the misleading impressions of working closely with our people. 

An example with how they used Leksi Bryan Charging Cloud’s name, “Another selling strategy and method of authorization is to make it appear as if the products originate from collaboration with Lakota language experts. A tribal member and language instructor recalls that Wilhelm Meya and Jan Ullrich from the LLC had traveled through Lakota country to gather support for their orthography. He and numerous other community members and Lakota language experts complain that the LLC came only once to chat with them but their names were listed as resources in the LLC books without their approval (EI-RWB-2013). Bryan Charging Cloud, an activist in Lakota immersion and revitalization, said he did not offer any information nor did he lend support to the LLC, but his name was listed as a resource (December 14, 2012, email). Like Bryan Charging Cloud, many Lakota who had been designated by the LLC as supporters have distanced themselves from the organization and their products. With the long list of names acquired in this questionable manner, the LLC approached tribal council members and tribal education boards to get formal letters of support, giving the misleading impression they work closely with Lakota community members and gained their consensus (EI-JYS-2013). Through the list of alleged cooperators and the letters of support by tribal officials, the LLC receives plenty of financial support,” (John, 2018).

Another example of giving these misleading impressions can be found in this Lakota Journal article in 2002, Sinte Gleska University to reject Lakota Language Consortium membership (Thunder Hawk, 2002). Basically by simply having conversations with teachers at SGU, a group from Indiana University, which would become the LLC, falsely created the impression that they were working together on their grant application. SGU applied for a grant, the same grant Indiana University/LLC applied for but was rejected. “Some educators at SGU still believe their name was used to leave the impression that they supported the grant request by Indiana University. They believe they lost their bid for a grant based upon this false impression” (Thunder Hawk, 2002).

Another example is when they blasted me in an official press release on May 18, 2021.  This has since been deleted but I did screenshot it. More on this in a later post but they wrote that it came from Rosebud, SD.  I asked my Father-in-law, who was the President of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe at the time, about this and he responded to me in an email and assured me that their Tribal Council did not support this nor his office’s Elder’s Council and did not know where it came from.

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And yet another example of giving misleading impressions to make it look like they are more community than they really are is on their website https://lakhota.org/our-role-and-impact/ where they have a memorial section to Albert White Hat (click on the link and scroll down), “Memories of Albert White Hat 2013,” where it looks like they worked together, and they supported Albert’s work.  This was not true. Ask the White Hat family but also take a look at this article. https://www.lakotatimes.com/articles/dear-editor-290/ They, the LLC, set themselves up as the authority and declared their orthography as the “standard” for Lakota country trying to overthrow decades of Mr. White Hat’s work on the Lak̇ot̄a Iyap̄i Ok̇olak̄iċiye orthography. It’s interesting to note the differences in approach to orthography here from Mr. White Hat and the LLC. Instead of declaring their orthography, The Lak̇ot̄a Iyap̄i Ok̇olak̄iċiye-the group Mr. White Hat worked with, as the standard like the LLC did with theirs, White Hat wrote in Reading and Writing the Lakota Language,if teachers wanted this particular alphabet system to become the official alphabet of their reservations, they would need to pursue its acceptance within their own tribal governments” (p. 6) (White Hat, 1999). Here is another cultural conflict, Mr. White Hat is saying, “if you want this,” he’s not forcing it on anybody and definitely not declaring the LIO orthography as the standard. He repeats this sentiment about choice again on page 10, “The orthography in this text is a suggested guide for writing Lakota sounds” (White Hat, 1999). Mr. White Hat was opposed to this group but their director, Austrian Anthropologist (Coleman, 2013), Wilhelm Meya had the audacious caucasity to give an interview on his behalf when he left (2013) and then posted it on their website. It’s still there. This is how they create the illusion that they are supported by our communities when they are not. There are a handful of people, sure, but that’s about it.

So I’m sure that a couple schools may have used their stuff in 2012 but it definitely was not “most” schools like they proclaim. 

Rosebud schools did not use their orthography or products, however, there are some on Rosebud who have forgotten all that has happened and now wish to step on their own Tribal Sovereignty by writing with the orthography from the New Lakota Dictionary and by using their flawed products.  Rosebud was 20 years ahead of us in relation to language/data sovereignty and protecting our language, don’t slide back now!

Currently, schools on the SouthSide of Standing Rock are no longer using any of their products or orthography.  I do not know the situations in other schools but with the scare you to death to create dependence tactics mixed with the misleading impressions of working with community people, I’m sure some schools are using their stuff but it’s definitely not most like they say, and it’s only a matter of time before they see through it all too.

Nahomnikhiye: “You can also read reviews of the New Lakota Dictionary on Amazon to find out what some Lakota language learners think of it: http://www.amazon.com/New-Lakota-Dictio ... s_11561_15

All of this to sell a book.

Chatka he miye lo.

Washicu chazhe, Ray Taken Alive emaciyab.

Ikce wichasha hemachayelo.

Lamakxota na madakota.

Txahamp Sheeca Thiyoshpaye, Kxangxi Ska Thiyoshpaye, na Aohomni Nakipxa Thiyoshpaye ematahnanyelo.

Wichoiye unkitxawapi kinhan txokatakiya takomni gluha maunnipi kte lo. Wowicala na wokunze yuha mani po.

lakotareclamationproject@gmail.com

Sources: 

(2013). “Albert White Hat, preserver of Lakota Language, dies at 74.” Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/obituaries/albert-white-hat-preserver-of-lakota-language-dies-at-74/2013/06/23/a05d49be-da81-11e2-9df4-895344c13c30_story.html. Accessed September 4, 2021.

Catches, V. “Txakini Iya Wowapi, Violet Catches, Lakota Orthography.” YouTube. Uploaded by Ray Taken Alive. January 18, 2021. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=StOWRp4IW4g&t=348s Accessed September 1, 2021.

Coleman, D. (2013). “Saving the Lakota Language: A Bloomington-based Initiative.” https://www.magbloom.com/2013/03/saving-the-lakota-%E2%80%A8language-a-bloomington-based-initiative/

Curley, L. “A Lakota Alphabet.” International American Indian Movement. https://internationalaim.wordpress.com/2014/10/31/lakotah-alphabet/ Accessed on September 13, 2021. 

Deloria, E.C. “A Chat with Mrs. White Face.” American Philosophical Society. https://search.amphilsoc.org/collections/view?docId=ead/Mss.497.3.B63c-ead.xml

Deloria, E.C. (2006). Dakota Texts 1st Edition. Paperback. BISON BOOKS. 

diphthong. Oxford Languages. https://languages.oup.com/google-dictionary-en/

John, S. (2018). Orality Overwritten: Power Relations in Textualization. http://www.sonjajohn.net/OralityOverwritten_PowerRelationsInTextualization_SonjaJohn.pdf

Accessed September 1, 2021. 

John, S. (2013). “Dear Editor,.” Lakota Journal. https://www.lakotatimes.com/articles/dear-editor-290/ Accessed on September 13, 2021.

Krashen, S. (1997). A Conjecture on Accent in a Second Language. http://sdkrashen.com/content/articles/a_conjecture_on_accent_in_a_second_language.pdf

Lakota Language Consortium. “Our Role and Impact.” lakhota.org. https://lakhota.org/our-role-and-impact/

Lakota Language Consortium. (2019). “History of Lakota Orthography.” YouTube. Uploaded by the LakotaLanguageConsortium. 2019. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TLuc9-YuuwM. Accessed September 6, 2021.

Nahomnikhiye. (Feb. 6, 2012). “Standard Orthography - a question.” https://www.lakotadictionary.org/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=90&t=3091 Accessed August 30, 2021. 

Nahwilet Meissner, S. (2018) The moral fabric of linguicide: un-weaving trauma narratives and dependency relationships in Indigenous language reclamation, Journal of Global Ethics, 14:2, 266-276, DOI: 10.1080/17449626.2018.1516691

Niyake Yuza, C. (2021, January 22). Ochethi Shakowin Data Sovereignty. Lakota Language 

Reclamation Project. https://lakotalanguagereclamationproject.com/blog/2021/1/22/ochethi-shakowin-data-sovereignty

Ong. W. (2013). Orality and Literacy: 30th Anniversary Edition (New Accents) 3rd Edition, Kindle Edition. Routledge.

Paskievich. J. (1996). “If Only I Were an Indian: Becoming A Native American in the Czech Republic.” Vimeo. Uploaded by Radek Wamblisha. 2011.  https://vimeo.com/24033319#t=1h55s. Accessed September 6, 2021.

Redshirt, D. (2016). George Sword’s Warrior Narratives: Compositional Process In Lakota Oral Tradition 1st Edition, Kindle Edition. University of Nebraska Press.

Rosebud Sioux Tribe Resolution No. 2012-343. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1vu7p82sfGMtSwfvsfvpQFalOHrw28dSO/view Accessed September 2, 2021.

Sebba, M. (2007). Spelling and Society: The Culture and Politics of Orthography around the World 1st Edition, Kindle Edition. Cambridge University Press.

Thunder Hawk, C. (2002). Sinte Gleska University to Reject Lakota Language Consortium membership. Lakota Journal. https://calthunderhawk.tripod.com/articles/aug30-sept06/sgu_llc.html Accessed September 3, 2021.

WhiteButterfly, K. “Lakota Sounds.” https://docs.google.com/document/d/1VBNtrH4-8ZOgL2FbH3q04GxkeP1TkQ_3/edit?rtpof=true&sd=true. Accessed September 8, 2021.

White Hat, A. (1999). Reading and Writing the Lakota Language. Sinte Gleska University and The University of Utah Press.





Ochethi Shakowin Data Sovereignty


When Covid-19 hit Lakxota (I will be using the Txakini-Iya Wowapi created by First Language Speaker, Teacher, and Linguist Txunwin Violet Catches for any Lakxota words in this writing) lands around the Spring many of us -- those who had the privilege to do so, anyway -- stayed home and did our best to follow the CDC protocols and guidelines. We spent hours at home trying to keep ourselves busy and sane by finishing those home projects we put off years ago, experimenting with cooking, face-timing and annoying our relatives, among any number of other endeavors.

Those tasks, large and small, happened because we found ourselves in new territory: we had time on our hands. With this newfound time, I thought -- after a couple of weeks of being absolutely lazy -- "all right, yes, I can finally work on my language," even though I had the time before.

This time, though, I stuck to it and started sorting through old texts, transcriptions, transliterations, Lakxota grammar, stories, and whatever else I could get my hands on. I spent hours in front of my computer with different books and resources.

Sorting through the Grammar book put out by The Lakota Language Consortium which was founded by a Czech person and an Austrian person, I came across something interesting in the opening cover of one of their books, “All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.” The thought came to me:  Who has the right to copyright things in our language?

Unci Delores (my grandmother) was used as a primary source in many of their resources including their grammar book. As a Lakxota, not only are these Unci's words and the words of our ancestors but they are also mine, my children's, my unborn grandchildren's; they do not belong to the Lakota Language Consortium.

In the copyright declaration, it says that none of it should be shared “without permission in writing from the publisher.” Why should I have to ask an outside entity if I can use my own language, especially words and knowledge from my own Grandmother? Whose permission did they get to do this? Which Tribal entities did they get permission from? How much money was made off these words that do not belong to these outside groups like the Lakota Language Consortium?

*****

These questions surrounding copyright led me to interesting places, interesting people, and interesting discussions, even if I, unfortunately, upset a lot of people speaking about these things. And those places, those people, those discussions brought me to something called Indigenous Data Sovereignty.

What is Indigenous Data Sovereignty? According to Indigenous Data Sovereignty and Governance at the University of Arizona, it “is the right of a nation to govern the collection, ownership, and application of its own data. It derives from tribes’ inherent right to govern their peoples, lands, resources.” 

But why Data? Why is this a big deal? We never even wrote our language down, so why is this important?

With many of our speakers leaving us, our language is also leaving this world, too. Libraries are leaving us. This virus is devastating to our communities. Many of those who grew up with our language as their first language, these amazing people for whom any word in this writing cannot do justice, are leaving us.

What is to be when many of them are gone? In the coming days, we will depend on what they have taught us, the language they taught us, what they have put in our hearts and our minds, the memories, the feelings. But we also will depend on data-recordings, translations, dictionaries, stories, writing, books, and all of the other pieces that fall under the data umbrella.

*****

I was reassured that the copyright statement I read was “standard” and that the LLC would just be happy that people are using their resources because they were made “for the good of the language.” I just said, “we’ll see.”  

In the first few days of the new year, I made a Language lesson in the Language Learning App Memrise. I used the Lakota Language Consortium’s Grammar book, lesson 49 because those are our resources, our intellectual property that they organized under copyright but that they did not get permission to do so with.  I posted this lesson in our Language Learning group on Facebook.  On January 6, 2021, I received an email from Memrise that said, “We’ve received a copyright infringement notice from the legal owner of the content posted in your course. As explained in our Terms of Use, copyrighted material you don’t have the necessary permission for are not allowed to be posted on Memrise.”  I would share the link I was originally provided, but that link leads to a 404 Error Message now.

Again, the Lakota Language Consortium has the copyright. They are, according to memrise, “the legal owner of the content,” so they wrote to Memrise and claimed ownership of this lesson. 

Memrise deleted the lesson.

I think it’s odd that a Czech person who plays Indian, as can be seen in a documentary on Vimeo, If Only I Were an Indian, also called Becoming a Native American in the Czech Republic (1995), calling himself Crazy Buffalo in the doc, and a different man from Austria, have more claim over our language than me, a Lakxota/Dakhota, a Lakxota Language teacher, learner, and parent.  

We are Hunkpapxa. My family comes from the Txahanp Shica Thiyoshpaye (wrongly called the Cheoxba by the history books). My Lala Shunka Wanbli fought in the Greasy Grass, went to Canada with Sitting Bull, and settled on Standing Rock. My Unci, Iteskala Win, sometimes Itesan Win, was a survivor of Wounded Knee. Way back in the early 1800’s our Grandfather Matxo Ite even shows up in documents fighting against encroachment. Matxo Ite had 6 sons: Iron Horn (my grandfather), Red Thunder, Little Bear, Bear Face, Shave Head, and Rain-In-The-Face. Iron Horn was the father of the first Taken Alive, and this is where our line comes from. We can track the Bear Face-Iron Horn-Taken Alive bloodline through 11 generations.  

Not only do they feel they have more claim over our language than me as a Lakxota person, but they believe they have more claim than even my own family.  My unci recorded many things for them. After she passed, they shared a recording of her on their YouTube page, LakotaLanguageConsortium.  I thanked them for transcribing it and recording it but said please ask my father before sharing.  This is the respectful thing to do, as my dad is currently the administrator of my Grandmother’s estate.  

In a now deleted response, they said, “We have permission from Delores herself.”  They claim they have control over her image and voice, even after her death, because they use Western notions of copyright and ownership and legal threats to continue to control what belongs to the Lakxota/Dakhota people to steward and care for. Instead of being stewards of the language, like so many assumed the LLC would be, their response was callous, disrespectful, and in direct opposition to what Lakxota/Dakhota people would have done or said after a recent loss. 

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*****

I truly believe we will have first language speakers again soon because of all of the many efforts and hours being put in by language reclaimers throughout the Ochethi Shakowin.  To bridge the generations of our elders and our children, however, data will be a huge part of our language Revitalization and Reclamation. I contend that when our elders leave us, whoever controls the data will control our movement. I simply prefer that the reins be in the hands of the Lakxota/Dakhota people and not any outside entities like the LLC.

Right now in Lakxota country, there is a big push to record our elders so we can preserve their language, teachings, and everything they are willing to share, so we can someday hope to pass these things on to the next generation.  Make no mistake, this is important; the question as to who will own the data, however, is important, as is how this data will be collected.

In college many of us have found ourselves in the odd predicament of looking up research papers in databases on our people only to find those things blocked by a firewall. If we want to surpass the firewall it will take whatever price set by the publishers to access that database or that article. I cannot imagine our ancestors who sat down with anthros, researchers, or linguists would have agreed if they knew these things were going to be gate kept and sold back to their grandchildren.

Whether we want to admit it or not, data can have huge financial implications. Although most do not view our language and teachings in this way of Capitalism, others do and are exploiting it.

This leads back to the Lakota Language Consortium and how they collect their data.  I recently received their “waiver” entitled, “Lakota Language Consortium Sound Recording Release,” that they use. The opening paragraph states [emphasis mine]: 

"I, ______________________________, (Speaker) for good and valuable consideration, the receipt of which is acknowledged, give to The Lakota Language Consortium (Recorder), its legal representatives, successors, and all persons or corporations acting with its permission, unrestricted permission to copyright and/or use, and/or publish sound and video recordings of me, and the analog or digital information pertaining to them in all current or future formats, or in which I may be included in whole or in part, distorted in form, or reproductions thereof for any other lawful purpose.”  

LLC+Release.jpg

This waiver gives the LLC permission to copyright and publish things for all current and future formats and the freedom to copyright our elders, our songs, stories, conversations, words, definitions, and sell it back to us.

This is the danger that comes from sharing our language with outside entities.  These outside entities could offer to record our elders, have them sign a waiver that strips our elders of their rights, offer them $25 to $50 an hour for their time -- and for many who may be experiencing high levels of poverty, this money may be needed. Now, however, that entity owns that data forever and can sell it back to the people many times over. 

*****

In their tax form 990 for the period ending June 2019, it becomes clear that they are making money off selling us back our stories and our language. In “gross receipts from admissions, merchandise sold or services performed, or facilities furnished in any activity that is related to the organization’s tax-exempt purposes,” they earned $200,798 in 2014; $244,105 in 2015; $278,910 in 2016; $234,306 in 2017; and $388,328 in 2018 for a 5 year total of $1,346,447.  This portion of the return describes the money they earned after selling admission to their classes, their merchandise and books, and their services in “sharing” the language. 

In the last 5 years they have made over 1.3 Million dollars selling our language and selling it as a service. According to their website, they started in 2004, so it follows that there has been a lot more money than that over the years.

Also according to that same tax return, Lakota Language Consortium founder from the Czech Republic Jan Ullrich earned $100,367 in 2018 from the “[e]stimated amount of other compensation from the organization and related organizations.” Wilhelm Meya from Austria, pulled in $96,314 from “Reportable Compensation from the organization,” and another $18,728 from “Estimated amount of other compensation from the organization and related organizations'' for over $115,000 in 2018.

That is a lot of money especially in comparison to the amount of honorarium an elder, the true authorities and experts of our language, might receive for trying to help by recording a narrative. It’s also a lot of money in comparison to the per capita income from counties on the Rezzes. In Corson County on the South Dakota side of Standing Rock, the county where I live according to the United States Census Bureau, the average salary for an individual (per capita income) is $16,449.

*****

On May 6th, 2017, The Economist (labeled as “neutral” in terms of bias and as “most reliable” by the Media watchdog adfontesmedia.com) spoke about the profitability of data in an article titled “The world’s most valuable resource is no longer oil but data,” saying data is “the oil of the digital era.”  The article goes on to say that the 5 most valuable listed firms in the world are Alphabet (Google’s parent company), Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Microsoft. 

For many, it seems ludicrous that Big Tech would be coming after Lakxota and Indigenous data. The reality is that they already have.

With an iPhone, you can use Lakxota Language settings, the Lakxota months (or, at least, someone's interpretation of them because they are all different), and the Lakxota days of the week using the New Lakota Dictionary orthography popularized by the Lakota Language Consortium. Who gave Apple the Lakxota/Dakhota people's tech and data? Was it the Lakxota/Dakhota people? Was it a Tribal entity? What arrangement was made? Who profits from it? Who owns this data? Is this now theirs forever to do with what they wish? Also, if there are opportunities for our data in tech, shouldn’t those opportunities first be offered to a Lakxota/Dakhota person?

Similarly, a very cool app called Stellarium Plus allows you to hold your phone up to the stars, move your phone around the skies, and chart constellations, including Lakxota/Dakhota constellations. Although I enjoy this app, I still wonder, where did they get the data to do this? Whose permission did they get? What was the arrangement? At the time of this publication however, they have since removed the Lakxota/Dakhota feature.

As I thought about these questions about data, oftentimes out loud and on various social media sites, a friend of mine sent me to a website, led by the Māori’s data department. The website is full of valuable resources including a video called, "Te Reo Māori Speech Recognition: A story of community, trust, and sovereignty." 

Presented at the 2020 Natives in Tech Conference by Hawaiian Language Reclaimer and Māori ally, Keoni Mahelona, he asks the question, "Who owns the data?" Mahelona goes on further to present the idea that the question of who "owns" the data is the wrong question to ask because it exists in two different outlooks: Western ideas of ownership (seen in copyright) and Indigenous ways of guardianship. He argues that we should look after data how we looked after the land: guard it and protect it for the right causes that are culturally appropriate and that the People should be the ones in control of it, not any outside entities.

The goal of our language revitalization is no question: to restart the intergenerational transmission of our language and have first language speakers again. Mahelona says that if we want our languages to be ubiquitous (present, appearing, or found everywhere) then it might be beneficial to work with these big tech platforms in order to help facilitate the transmission of our languages. Elders and communities, however, should adopt the royalty model. If the company is profiting off of it and are selling it as a service, our communities should receive royalties from that much like artists who allow platforms to stream their music.

But above all, the solution is Indigenous Data Sovereignty and that we retain the copyrights, and therefore sovereignty, over our language. We the people should be making these decisions on our terms with our protocols -- not any outside entities, and definitely not Big Tech. True Indigenous Data Sovereignty requires that tribes themselves receive first preference, which is a form of affirmative action.

The Māori’s solution? They have adopted and operate under the Kaitiakitanga License which is open-source but with affirmative action, the first choice and ultimate guardianship that Indigenous Data Sovereignty brings. This makes sure the data is collected using their traditional cultural protocols, and that the Māori own and control the data. The website koreromaori.io, which opens to the bold idea of “Indigenous language tools powered by machine learning,” states “Indigenous people do not have a concept of private ownership of land and resources, that's a Western construct by which many of us are required to abide. We see ourselves as the caretakers of our environment and society. Likewise, when we gather data to improve our services, we're taking care of the data given to us, and we follow Tikanga (cultural protocols) when we need to make decisions around using data or providing access to data.”  The Māori believe that the Māori should have access to the data, tools, apps, and anything new first. It is the only way for the Māori to compete with outside entities, they say. They say that their Kaitiakitanga License operates sort of like an affirmative action open source. Affirmative action meaning that if there are any opportunities in tech, jobs, apps, or anything related to the data-the Māori shall have preference first. Open source is making sure all Māori, and eventually the public, have access to their data so all who are interested can collaborate, study, teach, and learn their language (while they retain the control over the data).  In order for our language to remain in our guardianship, taking similar steps to ensure that the Lakxota/Dakhota people do the same with our language seems appropriate; Indigenous Data Sovereignty is necessary for the Ochethi Shakowin.

*****

In our current heartbreaking and perilous state, these discussions must take place now; we cannot wait. If there are any opportunities from our language data -- careers, jobs in tech (i.e. speech recognition development, app creation, website creation, etc), resource creation, grants -- those opportunities must be offered first and foremost to the Lakxota/Dakhota people. All the data must be returned to the Lakxota/Dakhota people, and we must assert our indigenous ways of guardianship (not ownership) over this data. 

If others wish to use our language, they must respect our communities, elders and Tribal and Data Sovereignty by getting permission from us: the ultimate authorities and not colleges/universities, outside entities who organized it under copyright, outside researchers, anthros, and linguists. From us. If outside entities are to profit off of it, they must adopt the royalties model with our elders and communities, always honoring Tribal Sovereignty. Outside entities should not be able to have the power nor authority to disseminate our data with other outside entities however they wish. 

The data and the direction of our language revitalization and reclamation must rest in the hands of the Lakxota/Dakhota people with our elders leading, our Lakxota/Dakhota learners and reclaimers sitting shotgun, and our allies riding humbly in the backseat.  Enforcing Data Sovereignty is the most powerful step we must take, as Lakxota/Dakhota people to ensure that we sustain our movement into the future. 

Wophila txanka echiciyapelo.

Hechetuwelo.

Chatka he miye lo.

(Ray Taken Alive)

Hunkpapxa hemacha.

Txahanp Shica na Kxangxi Ska Thiyospaye ematanhanyelo.

Lakotalanguagereclamationproject.com